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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29581851">in my blood &amp; in my bones</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/for_darkness_shows_the_stars/pseuds/for_darkness_shows_the_stars'>for_darkness_shows_the_stars</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>What Comes After [11]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Avatar: The Last Airbender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>A dash of worldbuilding sprinkled throughout, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Introspection, Ozai (Avatar) Being a Terrible Parent, Pre-Katara/Zuko (Avatar), Ursa (Avatar) is a Good Parent, Ursa-centric, aaah this was supposed to be a one-shot, but hopefully sweet nonetheless, i think i just have to accept that anything i write will inevitably turn into katara-simping, i'm sorry that's who i am as a person, kiyi's adorableness is a weapon of mass destruction, me trying to redeem the comics!ursa storyline: okay let's change absolutely everything but keep kiyi, might add some more idk, no homophobia in MY Avatar:the Last Airbender, not quite slow burn, this is basically every idea i think about when i'm trying to sleep slammed into one fic, this is the most self-indulgent thing i've ever written, ursa is a firebender you can't change my mind, when you write 27 k words because of one scene, zuko doesn't find ursa--ursa finds zuko</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-05-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-16 00:02:37</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>17,051</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29581851</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/for_darkness_shows_the_stars/pseuds/for_darkness_shows_the_stars</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Her Most Radiant Highness, the Princess Ursa of the Fire Nation, has just done the unthinkable. She has assassinated her father-in-law.</p><p>Firelord Azulon is dead. All hail Firelord Ozai.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Ikem/Ursa (Avatar), Kiyi &amp; Ursa (Avatar), Original Female Character/Original Female Character, Past Ozai/Ursa (Avatar), Ursa &amp; Zuko (Avatar), minor Katara/Zuko (Avatar) - Relationship</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>What Comes After [11]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1981828</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>104</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. agni's daughter walks alone</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Enjoy this insanely self-indulgent what-happened-to-Ursa story, that has pretty much nothing to do with every other what-happened-to-Ursa story on this site.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She arrived at the Colony shores in the dead of night, her inner flame doused in absence of light both literal and proverbial. She pulled the hood of her dark cloak over her face. Nothing could hide her fine, pointed features, her fair skin, and her golden eyes, not in the long run. But for now, this would do.</p>
<p>It had to.</p>
<p>Her clothes—nondescript. Rough-spun. Brown, to fit in both with the Fire Nation’s and the Earth Kingdom’s colour schemes. Durable and practical. A far cry from the fine scarlet silks embroidered with gold she’d worn in the Fire Palace. She would have missed the whisper of expensive fabric on her skin if it hadn’t been the least important of the things she had lost.</p>
<p>Ursa fisted her hands. It didn’t hurt. Another change. Her nails—trimmed neatly, practically. The nails of a woman who needed to work for every scrap of bread that found its way into her belly, not one who was served all the riches of the world at the quirk of her brow.</p>
<p>A princess no more.</p>
<p>With a heavy heart, she parted with a few coins. Their new home was the ship captain’s leather pouch. He was a robust, uncouth man, with a filthy tongue and a filthier vessel. Still, he’d agreed to take a woman who was obviously high-born and fleeing into the Colonies. Not many would take the risk to protect an enemy of the Crown for so little money.</p>
<p>Sometimes, she wondered if he knew exactly who she was. Maybe. But the man never said anything outright, and she knew better than to ask.</p>
<p>“Safe travels, m’lady,” said the Captain, smirking.</p>
<p>Ursa said nothing.</p>
<p>There was nothing to say.</p><hr/>
<p>She traversed through the Fire Nation-occupied lands with her head bowed low and her hair curtaining her face off. When she slept, her hand was curled around the hilt of a dagger. Fire Nation steel, smelted and shaped under the power of firebenders.</p>
<p>As Agni rose, so did she, and every morning she fell to her knees and prayed for her children’s safety.</p>
<p>She took jobs here and there to support herself. Mostly, she went about as a travelling herbalist. And if her eyes were <em>too</em> golden, no one would say anything to the woman who’d saved their child, their spouse, their parent with her tonics and her concoctions. Who’d have thought that the study of plants she’d undertaken as a young girl just to pass the time would prove to be her most invaluable skill. Because when one knew how to make poultices and pain-relievers and sleeping draughts, they knew how to make a poison so potent it could stop a healthy old man’s heart in <em>minutes</em>, with him none the wiser.</p>
<p>Azulon had known, though.</p>
<p>He always knew.</p>
<p>She’d knocked on the door of the Firelord’s suite, face grim and a vial pressed tightly in her hand. He’d opened, alone. He, and no one else.</p>
<p>He’d looked so tired than. Dressed in a thin sleep-robe rather than the heavy robes of the Firelord, his silvery hair down, the proud golden flame resting casually on his writing desk. Just a man—an old, exhausted man. Not a myth, not a legend, not a God come to Earth.</p>
<p>“Princess Ursa,” he’d said, a small, enigmatic smile on his lips. He’d always liked her, he’d confessed so himself. From the moment he met her, a babe with not a year lived to her name, swathed in scarlet silks, content in her mother’s arms.</p>
<p>Ursa did not remember that day, but she had heard the story told so many times that she might as well.</p>
<p>The betrothal contract had been signed a few weeks prior. The negotiations had been underway since she was born. It was rare, that Avatar’s grandchildren were born into the right class and family to be wed to royalty, after all.</p>
<p>She remembered her mother’s fond smile as she regaled them all with the tale of how her future husband and the father of her children, all of ten years old, had looked upon her small, sleeping face—and furrowed his nose.</p>
<p>Azulon had chuckled, Mother told her.</p>
<p>And now she looked into his eyes, clear despite his old age.</p>
<p>“Your Majesty,” Ursa had said, face steely. “May I come in?”</p>
<p>In place of an answer, Azulon had moved away.</p>
<p>He’d caught sight of the vial in her hand as she walked past him, smiled that enigmatic smile again. Sat behind his desk. Steepled his fingers together.</p>
<p>“My dear,” he’d said, shaking his head.</p>
<p>“You know why I’m here,” Ursa’d replied. There was nothing funny here for her.</p>
<p>He had known. And upon changing his will, upon letting her inspect it, make sure it was up to her standards, he’d lain in his bed, and accepted the tea cup she handed him.</p>
<p>“Cheers,” he’d said, and downed it in one gulp. Iroh would’ve had had a seizure, if he’d seen tea drunk like that. <em>Tea is meant to be savoured</em>, he’d told them all more times than she could count.</p>
<p>Ursa watched his throat bob as he drank.</p>
<p>“You are aware, my dear,” he’d told her carefully, in his last moments, “what you are unleashing upon the world.” For the first time that night, for all that Azulon was <em>so very</em> amused by the proceedings, Ursa wanted to laugh.</p>
<p>To think that she didn’t know? <em>She</em>, who’d been betrothed to that man since before she knew how to speak! <em>She</em>, who was married to him on her eighteenth birthday, the moment she could legally <em>be</em> married.</p>
<p><em>We weren’t always miserable, though</em>, Ursa had thought. There was a time, a few months after their wedding, when she thought she might love him.</p>
<p>“I’m aware,” she’d said. Cold. Resolute. Unfeeling.</p>
<p>Azulon had chuckled. She remembered wondering if he’d chuckled like that, that first time he ever saw her. “And you’re willing to do that? Bear that burden? That guilt?”</p>
<p>“Yes.”</p>
<p>No hesitation.</p>
<p>No regrets.</p>
<p>Never. Not when it came to her children.</p>
<p>The Firelord had smiled again, that terrible, enigmatic smile—no, <em>smirk</em>.</p>
<p>“You’d condemn the world to Ozai’s rule?”</p>
<p>“Yes.”</p>
<p>He nodded. “And you are aware, of course, that even if Ozai miraculously doesn’t plunge the whole world, Fire Nation included, into a dark age … you won’t be there to protect your children ever again?”</p>
<p>Ursa had fought a shiver. “I know what’s at stake,” she’d said.</p>
<p>And that was just the problem, wasn’t it? She’d spent the past ten years protecting her son, and eight, her daughter. But this … this has snuck up on her. An impossible choice. She could have protected her son now—save his life. But in doing so, she had effectively left them both exposed.</p>
<p>She cried herself to sleep at night.</p><hr/>
<p>Once she passed the border between the Homeland’s Colonies and the every-day-shrinking Earth Kingdom, she felt free … and more trapped than ever.</p>
<p>She was banished from the Fire Nation and its Colonies at the threat of death. Banishment, not execution. The last bit of courtesy Ozai was willing to give the woman he’d once maybe-loved.</p>
<p>For all that she had thought she might love him, he had thought he might love her as well.</p>
<p>Once.</p>
<p>A long, long time ago, when there were no prodigy children or power games to stand between them, only a young man and an even younger woman, who had known they would spend their lives together even before they were old enough to understand what that meant.</p>
<p>She may never return. Not to that life, and not to the Fire Nation. She didn’t care for the former. That film had been lifted from her eyes a long time ago. Maybe the first time she saw her former husband strike their son.</p>
<p>Ursa sighed. It was the little things, at first. A vicious jab, an inappropriate comment, dimmed light in her children’s eyes. (She prayed to Agni and all His Spirits it would never fade entirely.)</p>
<p>He never hit her, though. She wasn’t sure what to make of that.</p>
<p>Sometimes, she indulged in fantasies—Ozai, dead. Slain by an assassin’s arrow, or his brother’s own hand. It never mattered how. She saw Iroh on the Dragon Throne—grand and majestic as he had appeared the last time she had seen him, before he left for Ba Sing Se. She saw her banishment revoked, saw herself hold her children close, hide them in her arms, tell them she loves them and that she would never leave them alone again.</p>
<p><em>Well</em>, Ursa thought, as she hid her face under a hood in this Earth Kingdom town with no name, <em>those are only fantasies, after all. And I have much more important matters at hand to deal with.</em></p>
<p>Like making sure the Earth peasants didn’t recognize the strange woman in their midst as the Fire Nation’s runaway princess.</p>
<p>Her fair skin and golden eyes could be explained away. No one, no matter what side of the war they found themselves on, was comfortable discussing war children.</p>
<p>They weren’t all that common, either. For all the horrors her people spread around the world—and she’d seen more of those in these few short months than she had ever had any desire to see—codes of honour so intrinsic to the Fire Nation bound the men and women serving at the front.</p>
<p>No soldier worth their name would ever dare dishonour themselves so.</p>
<p>She hoped that never changed.</p>
<p>(She knew it would, with no Iroh in a command tent, and Ozai upon the Dragon Throne)</p>
<p>Still, she knew herbs, and within a week of arriving, she had half the population of this small Earth Kingdom village eating out of the palm of her hand after she’d helped their elders and their youngest with all their illnesses and complaints. Only teenagers still looked at her eyes with scorn, children old enough not to be trusting of a woman with kind words and kinder hands, yet still young enough not to have abandoned their idealism and national pride.</p>
<p>Ursa felt a stab of bitterness, there. After all, it had taken her years of marriage to a monster to see her perfect world fall apart. At night, she wondered how long had she been blind even to that? How many of her sweet boy’s bruises were truly from falls and accidents, and how many his own father had inflicted? For how long had he kept silent—never blaming his father, no, Zuko idealized that man to the point of danger.</p>
<p>It only offset how little Ozai cared for a son who didn’t throw his first sparks until he was six. Not that the daughter who first threw sparks at three and could make controlled licks of flame by the time she was four fared any better, of course.</p>
<p>But still. This tiny Earth Kingdom village rested on the outskirts of the great sandy expanse of the Si Wong Desert, close enough to the Colonies’ borders that seeing golden-eyed people wasn’t all that much of a novelty. Only sad.</p>
<p>Close enough, also, that the Fire Nation troops weren’t all that averse to an occasional raid. After all, the Si Wong Desert only protected that on its other side.</p>
<p>Not that it had helped Ba Sing Se.</p>
<p>(Not that it had helped their family.)</p>
<p>For all its simplicity, Ursa found herself liking the place, with its quaint stone houses, most of them built by Ke-Qin, the only earthbender left in the village after the Earth Army had had its pick on account of bad eyesight, with its simple, good people, who didn’t weave words and lies and half-truths like a seasoned weaver an intricate tapestry.</p>
<p>She’d been staying here for a week already, when, on her way to a sturdy stone farmhouse, where an old couple lived, with only their son as company and help, it occurred to her that … that she would not hate a life here.</p>
<p>A part of her, the part raised in the Fire Court, a part who’d called herself <em>princess</em> even before the Head Fire Sage bound her and Ozai’s hands together as Agni’s light spilled over the jagged edges of the Caldera and the new day greeted them, scoffed at that.</p>
<p>A Princess (no more), a lady (no more), among ignoble peasants of an enemy nation? Make a life among them? Die in a foreign land, her body buried in the cold, hard ground?</p>
<p>(Her ashes, never placed within an ornate urn blessed by the Fire Sages, never hidden away into her family’s mausoleum.)</p>
<p>But as the farmers’ son greeted Noriko, the simple herbalist who’d learned the trade from her mother with a bright smile, and an over-exaggerated wave, she couldn’t bring herself to care.</p><hr/>
<p>She wanted to hate the farmers’ son, she really did.</p>
<p>He was a man of thirty-five or so, wholly unremarkable in every way. Were it not for the bright green of his eyes, she would be hard-pressed to spot him in a crowd. He smiled entirely too much to be in the presence of a woman who’d recently lost both her children—not to death, though that’s what she had implied to the man’s injured mother when the old woman wanted to know what sorrow haunted her.</p>
<p>She didn’t know how to explain that it was all her fault.</p>
<p>She didn’t know how to explain that she sometimes thought death might be kinder than the fate that surely awaited them, trapped as they were, in their father’s shadow.</p>
<p>So she’d smiled, the sweet smile she’d used in court, and stuffed the pain deep down. Locked her children’s faces inside her heart.</p>
<p>Locked <em>Ursa</em> away and let <em>Noriko</em> take over.</p>
<p><em>Noriko</em> never spoke of her parents—she let others see her eyes and make their own conclusions. <em>Noriko</em> had only ever lived on the road, never had a place to call a home. <em>Noriko</em> had had a husband who’d loved her, and children who were no longer among the living.</p>
<p><em>Noriko</em> could be happy, maybe, living here.</p>
<p><em>Ursa </em>never could.</p><hr/>
<p>Discreetly, Ursa heated her hands—a small trick, increasing one’s body temperature. Not something a regular army goon would have the power or the precision to do. But she was a Lady of the Fire Nation, a descendant of an Avatar. The power that coursed through her veins had been carefully cultivated and bred for centuries. She ran the aromatic salve over the old woman’s—Annchi, her name was—leg.</p>
<p>Annchi sighed, letting her head fall back, as she trusted a firebender—a firebending <em>royal</em>, no less—to touch her. “You really do have a magical touch, my dear.”</p>
<p><em>My dear</em>. That’s what Azulon used to call her, ever since she was a little girl, playing chase in the Palace’s forbidding corridors with the other noble children whenever either of her parents brought her along.</p>
<p>Azulon had trusted her, too. Now he was ashes, deep in a golden urn in the Dragonbone Catacombs.</p>
<p>“My dear?”</p>
<p>“Sorry, Ma’am,” Ursa ground out. “I must’ve … wandered off, for a moment.”</p>
<p>Annchi gave her a <em>look</em>, a kind, motherly <em>look</em> that made her miss her own mother with bone-deep fervency. It even made her miss the Firelady Illah, who, although distant and entangled in her own duties, never failed to at least attempt and make her grandchildren smile, and always made sure they ate plenty of dessert on the rare occasions they all had dinner together.</p>
<p>“It’s fine,” she insisted, and set off on preparing a tonic for the old woman. It almost made her chuckle, when she put a cauldron full of water over the fire in the hearth. She could have that water boiling in a matter of minutes without a single flame—just her hands, and a lot of focus.</p>
<p>“You know, Noriko,” said Annchi slowly, “you don’t have to go through this alone. It can’t have been easy to lose so much. You’re a friend. If you ever need anything … our door is always open.</p>
<p>“Thank you, Madam,” Ursa said. “I appreciate it.” She did.</p>
<p>Appreciated it, certainly, but she would never take the kindly old woman up on the offer. She couldn’t. She wouldn’t do that to Annchi, whose leg was injured in a raid almost twenty years ago. Make her consort with—with a Fire Princess.</p>
<p>The old woman <em>beamed</em>, and it cleaved Ursa’s heart in two.</p><hr/>
<p>“We really can’t thank you enough, Madam Noriko,” the farmers’ son told her. He always insisted on escorting her from the town square to his family’s land and back. <em>For protection</em>, he’d told her the first time, and it was all Ursa could do not to snort.</p>
<p>She was a Fire Nation lady. She had been trained in combat firebending since she could throw sparks.</p>
<p>But she appreciated the sentiment no less.</p>
<p>“There’s no need to thank me,” Ursa told him. “Really.”</p>
<p>“No one before you could help my mother with her pains,” he insisted. “It means a lot. You’re really skilled.”</p>
<p>Ursa’s lip curved bitterly. “You have no idea.”</p>
<p>Azulon had looked peaceful, silvery hair spread like a halo around his head, on his fine, red pillow. His face—stern, even in death.</p>
<p><em>I’m sorry, Father-in-law, I really am</em>.</p>
<p>
  <em>But when my children are threatened, I <strong>bite</strong>. </em>
</p>
<p><em>And I’m willing to live—or die—with the consequences</em>.</p>
<p>“So … my parents asked me if you’d join us for dinner, three days from now?”</p>
<p>Ursa blinked, startled out of her musings. “I—I couldn’t.”</p>
<p>“Please, Madam Noriko,” said he. “We insist.”</p>
<p>Ursa considered. She … well. Only once. It couldn’t hurt, right?</p>
<p>“Well … maybe once,” she conceded.</p>
<p>He <em>beamed</em>.</p>
<p>“Don’t get too excited, sir,” Ursa warned him, with a soft smile.</p>
<p>“Please … Noriko …” he told her. “I think we’re first name basis by now.”</p>
<p>Ursa exhaled a shaky breath.</p>
<p><em>Do not get attached</em>. It was the one rule she’d given herself when she first set foot on that decrepit ship in Caldera’s port.</p>
<p>“Very well, then … Ikem.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. our sacrilegious duet</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It was three months more before Ikem asked her out.</p><p>Hmpf.</p><p><em>Asked her out</em>. That made it sound as though they were lovesick teenagers, not adults wearied by the world’s cruel games of chance.</p><p>Be as that may, he was shyly escorting her home, because that <em>only one</em> dinner had turned into one more, and then another, until she lost count, and her stay in this village—Nizu, she’d learned at some point—had stretched from a few weeks to indefinite.</p><p>It still amused Ursa when Ikem would insist on escorting her. Having experienced her first Fire Nation raid while calmly sipping tea with Annchi, she’d witnessed his combat skills first-hand. And as it was her who’d ended up beating the shit out of the dishonourable soldier who’d found his way into the farmhouse, she knew he’d witnessed <em>hers</em> as well.</p><p>Noriko, travelling herbalist, wife of a dead husband, mother of dead children, and now, apparently, a martial artist in disguise.</p><p>Every firebender was taught the basics of hand-to-hand combat. Every <em>person</em>, really. As a daughter of one of the most powerful families of the Fire Nation, her father wasn’t content until she could defend herself well enough on her own without a single spark.</p><p>As a young girl, this had seemed excessive; she was a firebender, after all—as a woman, she was glad. How else would she defend these people who’ve become her family when she couldn’t bend before them lest she be scorned, and turned away, and killed?</p><p><em>Ashmakers,</em> they call her people here in the Earth Kingdom.</p><p>She wished she could say it was undeserved.</p><p>She wanted to accept him. To go out, to be <em>Noriko</em>, to have fun and forget about her sorrows. She opened her mouth to say <em>yes</em>, when …</p><p>Eyes of gold on a young face flashed before her eyes. <em>Traitor</em>, a voice that sounded suspiciously like her beloved Azula’s whispered in her mind, dripping with poison.</p><p>Ursa … deserved that.</p><p>“I … I’m sorry. I can’t.”</p><p>She watched as light shuttered away in Ikem’s eyes, before he forcibly pulled a mask of indifference down. It almost made her laugh—after so long in court, <em>anyone</em> struggling with masking their real emotions was odd.</p><p>But she didn’t.</p><p><em>That</em>, she couldn’t just explain away.</p><p>“Is … is it okay if we’re still friends?” Ikem asked, a tentative hope in his voice.</p><p>World dropped down from Ursa’s feet.</p><p><em>Friends</em>?</p><p>She … she didn’t deserve friends, she who’d killed the man who’d thought of her as a daughter and didn’t regret it, she who plunged the world into darkness, she who abandoned her young children to the vicious mercy of a monster.</p><p>But …</p><p>“Of course,” she found herself saying. “Of course.”</p><hr/><p>“Let me just make some tea—”</p><p>“Nonsense!” Ursa interrupted. “I’m the guest here, Annchi, and besides, your leg is still weak.”</p><p>Annchi smiled. “You really are an incredible girl, Noriko.”</p><p>“Not at all,” she countered. “I was merely blessed with a mother who insisted upon imprinting me with manners—” at the level Annchi could scarcely imagine “—but never on the account of my personal interests.”</p><p>Annchi nodded. “Those poor noble girls … taught how to act and dress and eat and speak, then shipped off to marry whomever their parents settle on.”</p><p>Ursa shrugged. “Such is the nature of arranged marriages, I suppose.”</p><p>She didn’t know anything of how arranged marriages worked in the Earth Kingdom, but with the Fire Nation’s customs, she was intimately familiar.</p><p>Though she didn’t think the noble girls here had as much of a choice as back in the Homeland. Why the Earth Kingdom and the Water Tribes both chose to stifle half their population’s potential, she would never know.</p><p>But what she did know is that if she’d truly asked him, her father would’ve broken off the contract with Azulon, consequences be damned. And she remembered Grandmother Ta Min telling her stories of how she had ended an engagement that had been standing since she was ten in order to marry Grandfather Roku.</p><p>She wondered about her own children’s future spouses. Azulon had finalized the contract for Zuko a few years ago, and the official announcement had been made on Zuko’s tenth birthday, as was customary.</p><p>Ursa didn’t know Michi and Ukano’s daughter Mai well enough to tell if they would be good for each other, but the girl seemed smitten enough when she’d last seen her, and for all that Zuko didn’t appear to care for her existence all that much, she’d raised a polite, courteous boy. He’d treat her with honour and respect, even if he never loved her.</p><p>There had been some talk of possible matches for Azula, too, on a stroll through the gardens with Azulon mere months ago, in a different life. A century away. Azulon had a few youngsters in mind, but nothing definite. She wondered who Ozai would pick for his prized daughter.</p><p>She prayed every night to Agni her children would find fulfilment, if not happiness, in their marriages. That the person they were chained to would never turn out to be a monster.</p><p>She made her way to the farmhouse’s small kitchen and filled a kettle with water. Placed it over the unlit fire. Searched for spark rocks.</p><p>Found none.</p><p>
  <em>Agni, is this how non-firebenders always feel?</em>
</p><p>All in all, it wasn’t much of a predicament, but Ursa already felt raw from her contemplation of her children. She always did.</p><p>She closed her eyes. Took a deep breath, the way her tutors had instilled into her.</p><p>A spark shot out of her finger, and into the unlit wood.</p><hr/><p>Ikem watched his best friend <strike>the woman he was crushing on like a lovesick teenager</strike> <em>bend</em> a fire into creation.</p><p>As flames danced over the wood, Noriko threw her head back and <em>breathed. </em>The fire flared with every breath.</p><p>And Ikem felt stupid<em>, so stupid</em>, because she’d inherited her looks from her monster of a father, so why not his bending as well, and—</p><p>Noriko’s eyes found him.</p><p><em>Were they always <strong>this</strong> golden</em>?</p><p>Like twin suns upon her face.</p><p>Fear was her initial reaction, those golden eyes flaring wide—and then nothing. He watched as an indifferent mask slotted neatly into place, all trace of emotion vanishing from her face as surely as if it had never been there. She waited.</p><p>She was a <em>firebender</em>.</p><p>She could bend<em> fire</em>.</p><p>She was Noriko, and she’d helped his injured mother where no healer could. She’d played with the village children and refused his advances because she was still loyal to a dead husband. She’d beaten a Fire Nation soldier, and she hadn’t even been winded, but she still let him escort her from his house to the town square.</p><p>“Later,” Ikem said. “You can explain—later.”</p><p>Cocking her head, Noriko nodded, and went back to preparing tea with stiff meticulousness.</p><hr/><p><em>I could lie</em>.</p><p>This was the thought that ran through Ursa’s head as she hugged Annchi and her wife Liang, for what may be the last time ever.</p><p>
  <em>Because I may have to run.</em>
</p><p><em>Run and never return</em>.</p><p>It continued going through her head as she and Ikem changed their usual route, and instead of towards the town square, made their way to the forest, where there was no risk of anyone overhearing them.</p><p>Or maybe where no one could find her body.</p><p>But no.</p><p>She could defend herself.</p><p>She knew it, and Ikem knew it too. If he wanted to harm her, he wouldn’t dare take her alone.</p><p>“Well,” he said, when they were sufficiently far away. “Actually … no. Let me. You’re Noriko, and—”</p><p>“Stop.”</p><p>Her voice was indomitable, commanding. The voice she hadn’t used since she lived in the Fire Palace.</p><p>She could have let him finish. Let him make his own conclusions, and go along with them. But she was so<em> tired</em> of lying.</p><p>“That’s not my name.”</p><p> Ikem stopped. Stared. “Is there anything you <em>didn’t</em> lie about?”</p><p>Ursa’s head snapped up, and when she spoke, her voice burned with the passion of her Homeland. “I lied about my name because it was a <em>matter of life or death</em>. I never lied about anything else. People—you included—see me, and they come to their own conclusions. I just don’t bother correcting them.”</p><p>“I … fine.” He looked so tired then, almost as tired as Ursa felt. “What’s your name, then?”</p><p>“It’s—” she hesitated. She doubted he’d recognize the Princess of the Fire Nation by name only, but someone else might, and— “It’s too dangerous for you to know.”</p><p>“Why?” he asked, suddenly urgent. “Are you being hunted?”</p><p>“Not actively. But …” she smirked. “I know things.” <em>Have done things</em>. “Things that would make the Firelord sleep better at night if I were dead.”</p><p>Ikem froze. “The Firelord? You … you’re not from the Colonies, are you?”</p><p>Ursa gave him a haughty look. “I never said I was.”</p><p>“You said …” Green eyes widened as the realization washed over him. “You said … <em>west.</em>” And he was now rapidly realizing <em>what else</em> was <em>west</em> of Nizu. “What … what about your children? And your husband?” He sounded as though he wasn’t sure if he wanted to hear the answer.</p><p>Something heavy lodged itself in Ursa’s throat. Her shoulders slumped. “They’re alive, but … but I can’t ever see them again.”</p><p>“But you said—”</p><p>“I said they were <em>gone</em>,” Ursa snapped. “And for me, they are.”</p><p>“So you … you’re <em>married</em>?”</p><p><em>Did I fall in love with a married woman?</em> was the emphatic subtext.</p><p>“Not anymore.”</p><p>“But you said—”</p><p>“<em>Divorced</em>,” she snapped.</p><p>“Oh.”</p><p>Silence fell, and she felt awful for snapping at him. He was only trying to understand, after all.</p><p>“Look, Ikem … I didn’t mean to stay here for as long as I have. It was just supposed to be a pit stop. But … you, and your parents …”</p><p>“I see,” he said quietly. “Where were you going?”</p><p>She remained silent.</p><p>“Omashu?” he tried. “Ba Sing Se?”</p><p>A choked-up laugh escaped her. Ba Sing Se? The cursed city where this mess began?</p><p>“I sincerely doubt,” she said, “that Ba Sing Se would accept a refugee looking like me so soon after the siege.”</p><p>“So … you had no plan.”</p><p>A bitter chuckle. “My <em>plan</em>, as you put it, was to move from place to place … far enough from the border not to be seen by the Fire Nation soldiers, lest they recognize me, and close enough to it that my looks wouldn’t arouse <em>too</em> much attention.”</p><p>“I …”</p><p>“Oh, for Agni’s sake, man, don’t you recognize desperation when you see it?” she snapped.</p><p>Silence.</p><p>“Why were you banished?” he asked, voice hesitant and soft.</p><p>Ursa paused.</p><p>She <em>wanted </em>to tell him, tell him her name and her life story and everything.</p><p>But she was scared.</p><p>Well. It’s been a long time since she allowed fear to rule her.</p><p>“I killed a very important man.”</p><p>Ikem jolted. “<em>Killed?</em>”</p><p>She levelled him a flat look. “No need to sound so shocked. There is a war on. I’d wager there are fewer people in the world who had never killed anyone that those that had. I just happen to fall into the second category. And for all that I miss my home and my children, I don’t regret it for a second.”</p><p>“<em>Noriko</em>.”</p><p>She stared him down, letting her inner fire gleam in her eyes.</p><p>“Who?” asked Ikem softly, eyes falling closed.</p><p>Ursa cocked her head. “My father-in-law.”</p><p>Ikem’s head snapped up. “Your—<em>why</em>?”</p><p>“I had no choice,” she said, carefully enunciating every word. “It was either him, or my son. So I poisoned him, even if it meant I could never see my home or my children again.”</p><p>“What … what sort of a grandfather tries to kill his grandson?” Ikem demanded.</p><p>
  <em>His Incandescent Majesty, the Firelord Azulon, the Shadow Dragon, son of Firelady Akira and Firelord Sozin. </em>
</p><p>“It wasn’t like that. And my family isn’t … wasn’t like yours.”</p><p>“Yeah, no kidding. And your husband did nothing?”</p><p>Ursa scoffed. “My <em>husband</em> would not have minded. He was the one who was going to do the killing. It was him who I made the deal with. I kill his father … he succeeds his father’s position … I am banished, never to return, but my children are safe. At least for now.”</p><p>“For now?”</p><p>“O—the man who was my husband is a <em>monster</em>. I averted one crisis, but now … now I can’t protect them anymore … no one can. Their grandfather and their cousin are dead, their uncle has vanished from the face of the world, and I … I am gone. And they don’t even know why. I abandoned them to—to that <em>man</em>.”</p><p>“High-born,” Ikem breathed out. “You … you’re high-born, right?”</p><p>Ursa sighed. “I am,” she admitted.</p><p>“And the Firelord … he knows you killed this man?”</p><p>
  <em>Knows? It’s him I did it for.</em>
</p><p>“He does. But more importantly I … I know some things. About him. Things he would rather not have me share. The only reason I’m still alive is …” She ran a hand through her hair. “For the sake of”—<em>a love—</em>“something that could have been.”</p><p>“Can’t he protect your children from their father?”</p><p>Oh.</p><p><em>Oh</em>, she wanted to laugh.</p><p>She settled for a chuckle. “He can. He’s the <em>only one</em> who can. But he won’t.”</p><p>Ikem, thank Agni, didn’t ask why.</p><p>“So … you’re a Fire Nation noblewoman banished for killing an important man. How important?”</p><p>
  <em>The most important.</em>
</p><p>“Very.”</p><p>“And he was your father-in-law. And you know the Firelord personally. So …” He bit into his lip. “There are different tiers of nobility, right? I know there are in the Earth Kingdom.”</p><p>She nodded. “You want to ask how high up I am. Was.”</p><p>“Yeah.”</p><p>Ursa exhaled a tired breath. “I was born the eldest and only child of the Lord of one of the Houses of the Sacred Twenty-Five—the twenty-five most powerful noble families in the Nation, before you ask. I was meant to be his Heir, but my father-in-law … he was not a man to be refused. Not even when he took my parents’ only heir to be married to his son.” She looked down. “All my wealth, all my estates … I don’t have the access to any of it anymore.”</p><p>“And … and the family you married into?”</p><p>Ursa closed her eyes. “Please don’t ask me that.”</p><p>“Why not?”</p><p>“Because I don’t want to lie to you.”</p><p>“Then <em>don’t</em>.”</p><p>She looked up, gold meeting green. “I can’t.”</p><p>“You already told me you killed a family member. You told me you were a Fire Nation noblewoman. <em>What</em> could be worse than that?”</p><p>Urse felt heat pique at her eyes.</p><p>She was stupid. Stupid to think she could ever live the simple, beautiful life of Noriko.</p><p>“My name,” she breathed out. “It’s Ursa.”</p><p>Ikem nodded. “Ursa, then,” he tried on for size.</p><p>“Ursa … daughter of the Lady Rina and Lord Jinzuk. Princess of the Fire Nation. Mother of Prince—<em>Crown</em> Prince Zuko and Princess Azula. Kingmaker to Firelord Ozai …” A bitter twist of her lips. “Long May He Reign.”</p><hr/><p><em>A Princess of the Fire Nation</em>.</p><p>The woman before Ikem was—<em>had been</em>—the <em>Princess of the <strong>Fire Nation</strong></em>.</p><p>Noriko, the sweet-faced, kind-hearted herbalist, with a soothing voice and a cutting wit, who prepared poultices for his mother’s pains and helped around on the farm.</p><p>Ursa, the ashmaker princess, with flames dancing at her fingertips, the woman who’d poisoned a Firelord and felt no remorse, the woman who accepted exile with grace rather than see her son killed.</p><p>Her <em>son</em>.</p><p>The <em>Crown Prince</em>.</p><p>The <em>future Firelord</em>.</p><p>But Noriko … sweet-faced Noriko, daughter of an Earth Kingdom woman and a Fire Nation soldier who’d assaulted her, sweet-faced Noriko who could nothing about the colour of her eyes save travel around, and <em>heal</em>, and do all in her power to prove not all with ashmaker blood in them are monsters. Sweet-faced Noriko, who’d lost her husband and her children to the War and mourned them still, sweet-faced Noriko he <em>loved</em>—</p><p>“But …” Ikem choked out, “I <em>love</em> you.”</p><p>She looked up, a hint of surprise in her eyes.</p><p>So, so gold—a purer, paler colour than any he’d ever seen on a Fire Nation soldier. He’d chalked it up to coincidence, but … <em>high-born</em>.</p><p>And a firebender to boot.</p><p>“You don’t,” she said firmly. “You love the girl you’ve made up in your mind. Let me guess—a war child, forever burdened with an ashmaker’s face. Her family, I wager, died in the War, and they were all as sweet and as innocent as her.” She scoffed. “That’s not me. It never has been.”</p><p>“But …”</p><p>“Ikem, please.” Eyes of gold found his again. “For the sake of our friendship, wait until I’m far away before you rat me out. And give your mothers my regards. Tell Annchi I won’t make it for tea tomorrow.”</p><p>She turned on her heel with all the grace of a panther-dog, and make to leave.</p><p>“Noriko—<em>Ursa</em>—wait!”</p><p>“Not even that courtesy, then?” she asked, not turning. How could he ever have mistaken that haughty voice she used whenever she felt trapped for anything other than the markings of nobility?</p><p>“I’m not telling anyone.”</p><p>Nori—<em>Ursa’s</em> head snapped up.</p><p>“Excuse me?”</p><p>Ikem sucked in a breath. “I … I believe you mean no harm. You … you’re a friend.”</p><p>“I don’t love you,” she said. Sword-steel.</p><p>“You think <em>that’s</em> what this is about?” Ikem snapped. “Me catching feelings for you means nothing if you don’t return them. You’re so much more than a crush to me … you’re the person who keeps my mother company and helps her with her illness, you’re the person who always makes the best tea, you’re funny and sassy, and sometimes a bit odd, and you’re <em>my friend</em>.</p><p>“So … I won’t tell anyone. Your secret is safe with me.”</p><p>She turned, eyes wide, lips slightly parted.</p><p>“You don’t mean that.”</p><p>“I do,” said he, as stubborn as the most skilled of earthbenders. “I do. You … you don’t have to leave. I … I can’t even imagine how hard that must’ve been, and … if you ever need anything … we’re always here. My mother isn’t joking when she says you can always come to us for help.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Don't mind me, just dropping unnecessary amounts of exposition &amp; worldbuilding I've spent way too much time thinking about ...</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. so sweet (so selfish)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s three more months before <em>she</em> asks <em>him </em>out.</p><p>Ikem’s face changed through a multitude of expressions when she’d, in the shy manner of someone who had never had to court <em>anyone</em> because her marriage was arranged when she was still in the cradle, wondered if he’d be averse to having dinner, sometime, just the two of them, maybe?</p><p>Disbelief, wonder, joy, beaming.</p><p>“I’d be very happy to,” he told her.</p><hr/><p>Their first date, and oh how Ursa loved calling it that. <em>Date</em>. A <em>date</em>. She was <em>dating</em>.</p><p>Not courting, not going on strolls through the gardens with her betrothed, their chaperones marching a respectful distance away.</p><p><em>Dating</em>.</p><p>With no obligation, no duty, no impending wedding … nothing.</p><p>Just her, and the man she likes.</p><p>Loves, maybe.</p><p>But back to the matter at hand—their first date was simply a walk just like any other. When he was escorting her from his family’s farmhouse back to her small apartment they just … kept going. Talked, laughed.</p><p>Held hands, even.</p><p>He told her of his childhood in this small Earth Kingdom village, the games he played with other boys his age and all the ways he’d cheat at them, the occasional Fire Nation raids and the subsequent rebuilding.</p><p>(“I’m sorry,” Ursa whispered.</p><p>“It’s not your fault,” said Ikem, pressing her hand.</p><p>“I didn’t do anything to stop it … Agni, I never even cared—”</p><p>“Hey, hey …” he brushed a strand of inky hair behind her ear. “What’s done is done. You know now. And you’re … you’re helping us. That’s all that matters.”</p><p>She didn’t know how to explain to him that she and her children laughed when Iroh made a joke about burning Ba Sing Se to the ground.</p><p>She didn’t <em>know.</em>)</p><p>She told him of her training in firebending and arts, her interest in herbology, the games she played with other noble girls in the spacious halls and gardens of their estates.</p><p>(“Okay, so what I gather from this is, you grew up in a house larger than this whole village. The number of servants living on your estate was larger than the number of people I’d met <em>in my life</em>.)</p><p>“Well, that’s not how I would put it, but …”</p><p>“But …?”</p><p>“But essentially, yes.”</p><p>How to tell him she preferred this simple way of life, just for the freedom it gave her, over all the luxuries of noble life?)</p><p>A few dates later, he told her of his late wife, Huashu, who’d caught the red fever a few years back and hadn’t survived it. Once he was finished, his eyes were red and moist. In return, Ursa related the whole story of her engagement and marriage to Ozai, leaving nothing out, not the abuse heaped upon her son, not the conditioning that corrupted her daughter.</p><p>They cried together—for Huashu’s soul, for Zuko and Azula’s very <em>lives and sanity.</em> For the soldiers who fought and died for a pointless war—on both sides.</p><hr/><p>Annchi and Liang were ecstatic when they were told. She and Ikem had marched towards their house together, hand-in-hand, and announced their relationship.</p><p>“Oh, Noriko,” said Annchi, embracing her, with tears in her eyes. “You’ve been a part of the family for a while now, but now it’s official!”</p><p>(And how it stung hear <em>that</em> name coming out of the woman’s mouth. But they agreed it’d be best to keep <em>that</em> particular bit of information away from Ikem’s parents, at least for now.)</p><p>Ursa smiled so widely her face ached and returned the hug with all the ferocity of a firebender. She hadn’t had a proper family in so long.</p><p>No community where she had to tear herself to pieces to protect her children from the very man who was meant to love and cherish them most of all could be called that. It would be a dishonour to real families.</p><p>Liang patted her back and smiled, her green eyes bright. “Welcome to the family, kid.”</p><p>(They would never know that the tears in her eyes were not merely for the family she’d gained, but also for the one she had lost.)</p><hr/><p>News travelled slowly to this small Earth Kingdom village, but not even they failed to notice the increased brutality of the Fire Nation soldiers. Azulon, it seemed, had run a tighter ship that Ozai.</p><hr/><p><em>The Dragon of the West has returned to the Caldera</em>, rumour had it.</p><p>“He’s your brother-in-law, isn’t he?” Ikem asked.</p><p>Ursa just nodded. “He’s a good man.”</p><p>He stopped in his tracks. “He’s <em>the Dragon of the West</em>. The children here listen stories about him at bedtime. His name is used to scare them into behaving.” It never ceased to be strange how she could speak of Fire Royals. Like they were actual people, and not distant, vengeful spirits.</p><p>“He’s a brilliant general, that’s true,” Ursa allowed. “But he’s not cruel. The things … the things these soldiers are doing, those would never have been allowed under him. If <em>Iroh </em>were Firelord …” she didn’t finish. Ikem knew her well enough not to press.</p><p>But he understood what she meant—if Iroh were Firelord, Ozai would <em>not</em> be. If Iroh were Firelord, everything would be … not good, but better.</p><p>And she was the one who put Ozai on the Dragon Throne.</p><p>In the Earth Kingdom, regicide was unfathomable to most.</p><p>In the Fire Nation, the Firelord was Agni’s anointed, the Sun Spirit’s hand and voice on Earth. A god wearing a mortal skin.</p><p>…</p><p>No wonder they were all so loyal.</p><p>And she’d broken that loyalty, the loyalty to her father-in-law and her monarch and her god.</p><p>She didn’t regret it—she was always very adamant about that—and Ikem longed to meet her children, those two who commanded this incredible woman’s loyalty so thoroughly.</p><p>On the other hand, he dreaded under what circumstances that would actually be possible.</p><hr/><p>“So, then my mother came out to bring us back home, because it was already twilight, but we didn’t want to, so we climbed up on the tree. And my mother, like the smart woman she was, just said, <em>very </em>loudly, <em>‘It’s such a shame that they Ikem and Chino won’t come in. Don’t they know that great flesh-eating badgermoles come out from the ground at night to eat naughty children?’</em> Needless to say, we scrambled out quite quickly.”</p><hr/><p>“The Fire Sage kept droning <em>on and on</em>, about love and commitment and duty and honour, but Mother forbade me from yawning. It was <em>way</em> too early. I swear I saw Aunt Sakura doze off—and it was her wedding!”</p><hr/><p>“Oh, Ikem was such a cute baby, with just the pinkest, <em>roundest</em> cheeks and those <em>beautiful</em> green eyes!”</p><p>“<em>Mother.</em>”</p><p>“Oh, hush, darling, you know it’s true.”</p><p>“Well, <em>I</em> for one, think it’s <em>great</em> Liang feels the need to talk you up to me. Unnecessary, but great.”</p><p>“<em>Noriko</em>.”</p><hr/><p>“Would you maybe … would you ever like to have children? With me, I mean.”</p><p>“No, I was actually planning on having them with Gao from the butchery.”</p><p>“<em>Ursa</em>.”</p><p>“I … I don’t know. Where is this coming from?”</p><p>“I was just thinking. Because … I wouldn’t … one day, I wouldn’t be opposed to it. But I understand if … if you don’t want to.”</p><p>“I just …”</p><p>“It’s okay.”</p><p>“No, I … it’s not that I don’t want to, or that I think you’d be like … like him. I’m just scared. And … is it a betrayal? Am I betraying my children?”</p><p>“Shhh, no, of course you’re not. They’d want you to be happy.”</p><p>“Azula hates me.”</p><p>“She doesn’t. You’re her mother, she loves you, and she always will.”</p><p>“She believes I think she’s a monster … but I don’t. I’m just so, so scared for her. You don’t know the things he did to her, the lies he put in her head. And now … I’m not there anymore. I can’t protect her. I can’t tell her she’s loved. And Zuko … oh Agni, he <em>hates </em>Zuko, hates him for not being as ruthless and cruel as he is. I <em>left </em>them. They have no one, no one save each other, and he has been playing them against each other for so long now … they are alone.”</p><p>“Shhh, shhh. I know. I know. It’s not your fault. You did what you could.”</p><p>“It wasn’t enough.”</p><p>“… It never is.”</p><hr/><p> “We need to tell your mothers.”</p><p>“… are you sure?”</p><p>“I hate … <em>lying</em> to them. And I trust them, to keep the secret.”</p><p>“I … I don’t know how they’ll react.”</p><p>“I suppose we’ll see.”</p><hr/><p>“Liang? Annchi?” Ursa said, wiping her sweaty hands on the coarse fabric of her dress under the dinner table. “There’s something we need to tell you.”</p><p>“Congratulations!” Liang exclaimed. “I am so happy for you, we were just talking about it , and we think it’s about time—why are you looking at me like that?”</p><p>Ikem pursed his lips. “We’re not … we’re not getting married, Mum. Um, yet. Not that I’d be opposed or anything …”</p><p>“Neither would I,” Ursa cut in quickly. “No, I’d actually quite … like … um.” She felt heat pouring into her cheeks and wished she could bend earth in place of fire. Then she’d be able to make the earth swallow her, <em>literally</em>.</p><p>“But that’s not what we’re here to say,” Ikem said. “Um …”</p><p>“This is not how I’d planned this to go,” Ursa mumbled, and sighed. Interlacing her fingers in front of her and squaring her shoulders as though she were still in the Fire Court, she looked both of them in the eye.</p><p>Ikem’s hand went under the table and squeezed her knee in reassurance.</p><p>“My name,” said she, calm, cold, regal, “is Ursa.”</p><p>Annchi shrugged. “I figured <em>Noriko</em> was false. You’re not the only one travelling under an alias, dear. It’s safer that way.”</p><p>“I’m not done yet,” said she in reply, soft.</p><p>“Oh?”</p><p>“I was born in the Fire Nation. Not the Colonies. Not the Outer Isles. The Royal Caldera itself.”</p><p>Silence. She held their gazes with her eyes of gold. Felt their attention on her pale skin, the raven hair that had once been worn in a topknot.</p><p>“How did a woman from the capital of the Fire Nation end up here?” Jiang asked, her voice carefully controlled.</p><p>Ursa felt her lips twist into a wry smile. “As a result of a series of convoluted events.” Another squeeze on her knee. Ikem knew the whole story. She’d told it in whispers and hushed tones, tears trekking down her face and clogging her throat, gathered in his arms’ warm embrace. “But … I suppose it began with the Siege of Ba Sing Se.”</p><p>She’d lost them there, she saw by their confounded looks.</p><p>But then again, to someone who was unfamiliar with everything that had happened, it made no sense.</p><p>“My nephew, you see, was killed then,” Ursa said quietly. “He was a brilliant young man. Bright and kind and always ready to laugh. His death … broke my once-brother-in-law. And my ex-husband …” She closed her eyes for a moment, driving her hands apart and fisting them in her lap. “He made a … a demand, of his father. As my brother-in-law hadn’t returned home after the Siege, and his only son was gone … my husband proposed that his father make … him, his Heir. Our children were alive, and healthy.”</p><p>“Heir …” Annchi breathed. “You … you’re a noble?”</p><p>Ursa let out a wet chuckle.</p><p>“You could say that,” Ikem said, hand moving up to rest on her shoulder. She relished in the contact. It grounded her against the slipping that threatened.</p><p>“My father-in-law … was furious,” Ursa explained. “My brother-in-law had ever been  the favourite, and there was my husband, impertinently demanding his birthright be taken away, so soon after the loss of his only, beloved child.” She shook her head. “The children and I were sent out while my husband was dealt with, but … I suppose they … snuck in.”</p><p>“Oh, dear,” muttered Jiang.</p><p>“I don’t know what was said in there. All is know is that I went to my son’s room to tell him goodnight when I found his sister there … gloating.” Something wet slipped down her face, but she was too far away to make any note of it. “I took her away and asked her about it. She told me … she said my father-in-law had ordered my husband to … kill … <em>oh, Agni</em>.” She broke down, cradling her head in her hands. Ikem’s voice murmuring reassurances was too distant to understand.</p><p>“It’s okay, dear,” Annchi was saying. “You don’t have to go on.”</p><p>
  <em>Oh, but she did.</em>
</p><p>“I went to confront my husband about what she’d told me, and he just … confirmed my daughter’s words. My father-in-law had said my husband had to experience the same loss as his brother-in-law … the loss of a firstborn son.”</p><p>Silence fell. Silence in which Annchi and Jiang slowly came to realization what exactly <em>that </em>meant.</p><p>“<em>Holy Spirits</em>,” muttered Jiang.</p><p>“I couldn’t let that happen,” Ursa went on bravely. “So I made a deal with my husband. In exchange for our son’s life, I would … I would remove his father from the picture and ensure he is the Heir.” A bitter laugh. “If you know how to make tinctures and poultices out of plants, you also know how to make poisons. Poisons potent enough to kill a man within minutes, poisons invisible enough no one would ever suspect them. And … to ensure that I would never betray him, I had to leave the Caldera, and the Fire Nation entire.”</p><p>“Oh, you poor girl,” said Annchi, and made to envelop Ursa in her arms.</p><p>“Don’t,” whispered Ursa, small and broken. “I’m not done yet, and … and you’ll …”</p><p>Annchi looked torn, but she settled for putting a hand on Ursa’s shoulder. Jiang made a <em>go on</em> gesture.</p><p>“My name,” she said quietly, “is Ursa. My father-in-law was … was …” She shut her eyes, and ground her teeth. “He was Azulon, My husband was Ozai, my brother-in-law Iroh.” Looking up, she stared Annchi and Jiang down. “I was a princess of the Fire Nation.”</p><p>Annchi’s hand on her shoulder stiffened, and Ursa hardly dared breathe.</p><p>“Oh,” Jiang said.</p><p>Silence.</p><p>Then …</p><p>“Maybe … maybe we should go,” Ikem suggested delicately. “At least until you two … process everything. C’mon, Ursa.”</p><p>“Yes …” Jiang said quietly, “maybe that’s for the best.”</p><p>Ursa’s heart cleaved in two as she made her way out, clinging into Ikem’s hand.</p><hr/><p>“It’s going to be fine,” he whispered into her hair.</p><p>She didn’t answer.</p><hr/><p>“She’s a Fire Princess,” said the Earth Kingdom woman, sitting in an ancient armchair, her bad leg propped up.</p><p>“I know,” replied the woman’s wife, pacing the small length of their sitting room.</p><p>“Ikem loves her,” the woman continued.</p><p>“Yes, we both saw that. She loves him too.” The other one bowed her head. “I don’t … I don’t understand.”</p><p>“Neither do I,” muttered the woman. “But … she’s still the same girl we know. Only now all the strange things about her <em>make sense</em>.”</p><p>“I suppose. But if her husband—<em>fucking Ozai</em>—wasn’t a power-hungry bastard, Noriko, Ursa, whatever you call her—would still be up there in their fancy royal palace, watching impassively as <em>we</em> are <em>crushed</em>.”</p><p>“But she’d not like that anymore,” the woman reasoned. “We both know it. She has … learned.”</p><p>“I didn’t think ashmakers <em>could</em> learn,” muttered the other.</p><p>The woman’s lips quirked up. “Neither did I.”</p><p>“So, we’re in agreement, then.”</p><p>“That depends,” said the woman. “Are you willing to lose our son over the girl’s background?”</p><p>“<em>Oma and Shu</em>, no.”</p><p>“Then we are,” said she, smiling.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. this blessed life (i can almost forget)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Please tell me you don’t have <em>more</em> terrifying relations you need to tell us about, Ursa,” said Jiang, when her son and his son’s beau sat them down at the kitchen table because they had something to say, <em>again</em>.</p><p>Ursa blinked. “Um … not as far as I’m aware? But really, the Fire Nobility are all related in some way or another, so …”</p><p>“So are Earth,” Annchi chuckled.</p><p>“So, what do you two need to tell us now?”</p><p>“Well,” said Ikem, taking Ursa’s hand. “This time, we actually <em>are</em> getting married.”</p><hr/><p>The day of Ursa’s second wedding couldn’t have been more different than her first. She was not woken in the middle of the night to be scrubbed within an inch of her life, painted with tonnes of makeup that was somehow completely invisible as a finished product, dressed in heavy white silks and decked in gold and jewels, only to sit and listen to the Head Fire Sage drone on and on about the establishment of marriage, subtly exchanging exasperated glances with Ozai.</p><p>Their hands weren’t bound with exquisite red cord as dawn rose over the jagged peaks of the Royal Caldera. She wasn’t required to kneel and recite her oaths as the Fire Sage crowned her Princess. Afterwards, there was no grand feast. She wasn’t swarmed by nobles and socialites who wished to curry favour with the newest member of the royal family.</p><p>No.</p><p>She rose with the sun, as she did every day. Opened the simple wooden cabined by her bed, pinched the candlewicks inside alight. She bowed before the two portraits hidden there, pressed her forehead to the ground before her children, and prayed. Beseeched Agni for their safety, as she did every day, begged their blessing for what she would do today.</p><p>Later, she welcomed other village women into her apartment. She didn’t know any of them all that well, always careful to keep her distance from everyone except Ikem and his family.</p><p>But now, these women didn’t seem to hold it against her. With no relation left to help her prepare every single one of them seemed to be intent on taking over the role of her mother. They chatted amiably as they helped her into her finest dress—something she would never condescend to wear only a year ago.</p><p>A lot has changed since then.</p><p>Her hair, in spite of the women’s protestations, was worn down. She may have left the Fire Nation for good, but that didn’t mean she had to get married wearing her hair Earth Kingdom style.</p><p>The Earth Shaman was invited to come from one of the larger surrounding villages—an old, grey man with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes and lines of laughter carved into his face.</p><p>“You may now kiss the bride,” he said. His smile reminded Ursa of Grandpapa Fudo whenever she’d demonstrate a new kata—affectionate and proud. But then Ikem’s lips captured her own, and all thoughts of grandfathers vanished from her head.</p><hr/><p>Things Jiang learned about her new daughter-in-law:</p><p> </p><p>She rose with the sun every day, without fail. No matter when she went to sleep, not matter <em>where</em>, as dawn crested the edges of the horizon, Ursa woke. When asked, she’d chuckled, in that fine, posh way of hers, hiding her mouth behind a hand. “Firebenders rise with the sun,” she said.</p><p> </p><p>In a similar vein, she could always tell what time it was, though it took her some time to convert whatever system of measurement they had in the Fire Nation into typical Earth Kingdom hours.</p><p> </p><p>She had no problem with work on the farm, so long as someone showed her what to do. Royal etiquette lessons apparently don’t cover caring for pig-chickens and growing potato-chokes.</p><p> </p><p>She could cook. When Annchi inquired as to <em>why</em> someone who’d always had personal chefs could cook, she’d smiled. “It was one of my … interests.” Ah. Like herbology, which allowed her to poison her own father-in-law. Like combative firebending—</p><p>“Oh, no,” Ursa said, laughing. “<em>Everyone</em> learns that. And if they can’t bend they usually master some other martial art.”</p><p>At Annchi and Liang’s stunned looks, she curved a perfect brow. “What, you don’t learn how to fight here? I know <em>you</em> aren’t much of a fighter, darling,” a squeeze of Ikem’s hand, “but surely you learn <em>something</em>?”</p><p>“But …” Annchi said, uncomprehending, “you’re a <em>woman</em>.”</p><p>Ursa frowned. “What does that have to do with anything?”</p><p>Which is how they learned that gender mattered very little in the Fire Nation. That some of their most powerful and feared military commanders, ministers and politicians were women. That quite a few Firelords over the course of history were women.</p><p>(“If we ever have a daughter,” Ursa told Ikem late that night in the privacy of their bedroom, “we’re going to teach her how to defend herself, right? We can’t … we can’t leave her helpless when the Fire Nation raids are getting more and more common.”</p><p>Neither mentioned that the recent shift in power behind the Dragon Throne is the likeliest reason of that.</p><p>“Of course, darling,” said Ikem, and kissed the crown of her head.)</p><p> </p><p>Ursa knew more about Earth Kingdom geography than the three of them combined. The effect was ruined, somewhat, by her knowledge consisting almost exclusively out of the list of resources the Fire Nation wished to claim in every particular area, and where was it easiest for armies of ashmakers to pass.</p><hr/><p>Things Annchi learned about her new daughter-in-law:</p><p> </p><p>She was a bit of a snob, but it was small enough to be charming instead of annoying. And she was working on it.</p><p> </p><p>She hasn’t worked a day in her life but that never stopped her from trying to learn. And yes, her early attempts at cooking for anyone but herself weren’t the best, but she was rapidly improving.</p><p> </p><p>Her tolerance for alcohol was impressive, as Annchi had discovered one day when shed acquired a bottle of wine. Together with Jiang and Ursa, she kicked Ikem out of the house for the evening and decided to have a girls’ night for once. In the morning, Annchi and Jiang’s heads were bursting, but Ursa was barely affected</p><p>“Two reasons,” Ursa said, when asked, smiling far too brightly for Annchi’s pained sensibilities. “One: firebender physique. Alcohol doesn’t affect us all that much. Two: experience.” She grinned. “You’d be surprised how much wine there is at social events and feasts. I had to know my limits precisely, because crossing them would mean a scandal.”</p><p> </p><p>Spark rocks were altogether unnecessary when one had a firebender as a tenant. Ursa could light fires with barely a breath, boil water in a matter of minutes by simply holding the pot in her hands, regulate her own bodily temperature, and many more things Annchi hadn’t had the chance to observe just yet.</p><p>When she breathed, the flames breathed with her. She could form shapes out of them, let them dance over her fingers and hands. Not a single stray spark escaped.</p><p> </p><p>If goaded properly, she could go on hour-long rage rants about dozens of different Fire Nobles, critiquing everything fro, their looks and manners to their competence and lineage. Annchi’s personal favourite was the rant about ‘the Lady Emiyo’, who apparently sent her son to ‘woo Azula’, a tirade that eventually evolved into unconnected curses in ancient Fire Tongue.</p><p> </p><p>She loved her children, in the faraway Caldera, with all her heart.</p><p>She had portraits—two ink paintings, in black and white, of a young boy with solemn eyes and dark hair pulled up into a tall phoenix plume, and an even younger girl whose lips were curved mischievously, and her hair arranged in a topknot, leaving two strands hanging at either side of her face.</p><p>“Zuko and Azula,” Ursa said, the foreign names rolling of her tongue like it was the most natural thing. Every morning, after the dawn woke her, she spent an hour kneeling before those portraits with candles burning all around, beseeching the Fire Nation’s beloved Sun Spirit for their safety.</p><hr/><p>When Ikem arrived home after an errand at the market, he found Ursa sitting of their bed staring emptily into the closed doors of the cabinet where she kept her candles and the portraits of her children. Her eyes were red, face wet, hands wrapped around her abdomen as though she was trying to keep herself from falling apart.</p><p>“Darling?” Ikem said, coming to sit by her. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “Are you okay?”</p><p>Instead of an answer, Ursa buried her face into his shoulder and let silent sobs wrack her body.</p><p>“No, no, don’t cry love, it’s okay,” Ikem soothed, running his fingers through loose black locks. “What happened?”</p><p>“I … I’m pregnant,” Ursa whispered brokenly, and Ikem felt the world drop from under his feet.</p><p>“Really?” he asked, voice hoarse with wonder.</p><p>Ursa nodded, and buried her face in her hands.</p><p>Ikem’s gaze travelled towards her cupboard.</p><p>Oh.</p><p>“Love, it’s okay. I’m not Ozai. I’d never, ever hurt our child. I’ve only learned of them a few moments ago, and already I love them more than anything in the world.</p><p>“You will never have to leave them, I promise. We’re in this together, you and I. And my mums, too. They’ll spoil this little one rotten. I swear they’ll never know a day’s worth of sorrow.” It wasn’t something he could promise, he knew, even without taking the armies of the Fire Nation marching across the continent into account.</p><p>But he could try.</p><p>And so Spirits help him, he would try.</p><p>He didn’t know what nightmares chased Ursa from sleep at night. He didn’t want to pressure her into revealing what she wasn’t ready to reveal.</p><p>So he'd just hold her, whenever she woke, rub circles into her back and whisper soothing words.</p><p>“I love you,” he said, kissing her temple lightly. “And I love this little one so much. Nothing will ever happen to us. We’ll be fine.”</p><hr/><p>Prince Zuko, the First of His Name, firstborn son of Princess Ursa and Prince Ozai, came into this world eighty-three years after the Fire Nation’s Great March of Civilization began, in the early morning hours of the Winter Solstice, after a difficult pregnancy and a premature labour. Rain and lightning danced over the sky as his first weak cries echoed the delivery room.</p><p>A child born on the longest night of the year, a royal child no less, was never a good omen, but the young prince was also tiny and frail to boot. For days did his lady mother and the Fire Sages pray before Agni’s many altars, begging their great Sun Spirit to grant the little one strength.</p><hr/><p>Princess Azula, named for her grandfather, Firelord Azulon the Shadow Dragon, daughter of Princess Ursa and Prince Ozai, announced her arrival by screaming at the top of her lungs at high noon of an auspicious Midsummer day, eighty-six years after her famed ancestor unleashed fiery inferno upon the Air Temples.</p><p>The nurse who delivered her swore the girl was spitting sparks even then, so eager was she to greet Agni and push the world under her boot.</p><hr/><p>Kiyi, she of no royal title, daughter of Noriko the Herbalist and Ikem the Farmer, was born in an inconsequential farmhouse, in an inconsequential Earth Kingdom village, under the gentle care of her grandmothers and the worried eye of her father on a sunny autumn day ninety-seven years after the Air Nomads have been brutally exterminated.</p><p>She rested in her mother’s arms, sleepy hazel eyes—eyes for which they would never be able to determine if they were of Earth or Fire—blinking up lazily.</p><p>They weren’t Azula’s burning amber, wide open even at only a few hours old, taking in the world around her, already calculating how to best bring it to heel.</p><p>They weren’t Zuko’s prized pale gold, once boasted by Firelord Sozin himself, closed for those agonizing first few days, when they didn’t know if he would make it and Ursa prayed and prayed, frenzied and desperate. </p><p>The dark tuft of hair on her head wasn’t quite the black of raven’s plumage common in the Homeland, her skin held a healthy tan, her features, even now, pointed towards a wide, heart-shaped face.</p><p>There was very little of Ursa in Kiyi. Perhaps some traces, in the shape of her eyes. Everything else was Ikem. Everything else was Earth Kingdom.</p><p>Ursa hated how glad she was of that.</p><p>She didn’t know what she’d do if another golden-eyed child stared up at her with adoration, only to watch that light be dimmed.</p><p><em>No</em>.</p><p><em>That will never happen to you, my love, <strong>I swear</strong></em><strong>. </strong><em>I swear by Agni and all my ancestors. I’ll protect you. I won’t fail <strong>you</strong></em>.</p><p><em>My love, my light, my beautiful little girl</em>.</p><p><em>Never again</em>.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. shatter me</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The news that reached this small Earth Kingdom village were infrequent, oftentimes incorrect, or at least wildly exaggerated, their flow irregular. Chances were, the Earth Kingdom would fall and they’d only learn of it when the Fire Nation came knocking.</p><p>That being said, Ursa eagerly soaked up every little bit of information about the happenings at the Fire Court she could scrounge up. Taking everything above into account … that wasn’t much.</p><p>Still, every little bit there was, Ursa would find, searching with steely determination that characterized so many of the Fire Nation’s people.</p><p>So Ikem knew he should tell her. Better she hear it from someone she loves. Better she hears it in a place where she can freely break down.</p><p>But … let’s not get too ahead of ourselves.</p><hr/><p>“Have you heard the news?” asked the innkeeper, late in the night in the village’s only tavern, He was wiping the already clean bar. In the candlelight, his muddy green eyes glimmered.</p><p>“I hate it when people do that,” said the youngster, leaning back in his tall chair. “I mean, what news? Do you know how many news there are out there? How should I know which of them you’re thinking of?”</p><p>“Okay,” said the innkeeper, plucking the beer from the youngster’s hand. “That’s enough for you. You always get philosophical when you’re tipsy.”</p><p>“OI!” protested he. “That’s mine,”</p><p>“Not anymore it isn’t.” The innkeeper winked, and downed the last few gulps. Wiping his mouth on the back of his hand, he went on. “Anyway, you’re not going to believe what I heard yesterday evening. Some Fire Nation soldiers came around—”</p><p>The youngster’s lip curled.</p><p>“You served ashmakers!” he exclaimed, pointing an accusing finger at the innkeeper. Well, the general area of the innkeeper’s thick, beefy neck. He <em>was</em> tipsy, after all. Ikem supressed a chuckle.</p><p>“I serve everyone who pays and doesn’t act like a brute,” said the innkeeper, severely unimpressed. “Now, normally I never get them intoxicated enough to talk. No matter how much they drink, the alcohol never seems to affect them …” O, Ikem knew <em>that</em>. “Anyway, yesterday they seemed intent on getting drunk … When I asked why—” In the unobtrusive, supportive way of innkeepers all around the world, of course “—apparently, there’s been a scandal with their royal family.”</p><p>The youngster spat on the ground. The innkeeper curved a brow. “You’re cleaning that.”</p><p>“Fuck you,” hissed the youngster, with no passion.</p><p>Ikem patted his shoulder. “You were saying?” he asked, trying to act indifferent. But the royal family meant <em>Ursa</em>, and, hell, in some twisted way <em>he</em> was a part of it.</p><p>“Right,” said the innkeeper. “Apparently, it was one of those <em>I’m losing faith in the Firelord and the only way to deal with that is to get roaring drunk, no matter how much beer it takes</em> moments.”</p><p>“Ashmakers? Losing faith in the Firelord?” the youngster snorted, disbelieving. “Yeah, right. They’re all rotten.”</p><p>Ikem was equally disbelieving, though for different reasons.</p><p>The innkeeper raised his arms, palms flat and facing outwards. “Don’t attack me, I’m only telling you what she said.”</p><p>“No one’s attacking you,” Ikem said. “Why was she losing faith?”</p><p>“Filthy ashmakers,” grumbled the youngster. “Women—combatants! Despicable barbarians, I’m telling you.”</p><p>Ikem’s inner <em>Ursa-ranting-about-gender-equality</em> reared up its head and he <em>wanted</em> to make an impassioned speech. As that wouldn’t be practical at all, he just curved a brow. “And yet they’re winning the War. And if our soldiers ever made it into their scorching homeland, <em>their</em> women wound never meekly submit to abduction and rape and death of their children.”</p><p>The youngster stared at him, wide-eyed.</p><p>The innkeeper barked a laugh. “Sometimes I forget you’re married to a Colonial.”</p><p>“Noriko lost everything to the War,” Ikem said firmly, daring the youngster to dispute his claim. It wasn’t wrong, per se. Ursa had lost so much—just not in the way they would think.</p><p>“Not everything’s black and white, you know,” said the innkeeper, directed at the youngster.</p><p>He answered only in incomprehensible grunts.</p><p>“Anyway,” said the innkeeper, smiling gleefully, “apparently the Firelord banished his own son, the Crown Prince.”</p><p>Ikem’s entire world narrowed down into the innkeeper, and his words.</p><p>“What?”</p><p>“Oh, yes. No one knows why, or what happened. Just that the boy’s been sent away, with a ship and a crew, never to return to the Fire Nation, unless …” His brows shot up.</p><p>“Unless <em>what</em>?” Ikem hissed, probably more urgent than he should’ve been.</p><p>“Get this—unless he <em>finds the Avatar</em>.” A thunderous laugh. “I mean really. Might as well have said, bring down the moon. At least you know the moon exists!”</p><p>“Good riddance,” the youngster snorted.</p><p>
  <em>Oh, Spirits …</em>
</p><p>“He’s only thirteen …” Ikem said softly. He hadn’t meant to say it out loud. It just … escaped.</p><p>“How do you know that?” the innkeeper asked, sounding interested. The information on the royal family, after all, was so hard to come by.</p><p>How did he know? How could he not?</p><p>When he was the one who had held Ursa’s hand as she lit a candle every Winter Solstice on his birthday, offering prayers for her son’s wellbeing to her Sun Spirit. The last one was only seven months ago.</p><p>“His Colonial wife, no doubt,” snorted the youngster.</p><p>Azula’s birthday candles were lit on Midsummer.</p><p>“Yes,” Ikem snapped.</p><p>He had nothing to be ashamed of.</p><p><em>Oh, Spirits</em>. Ozai banished his <em>thirteen year-old</em> son. Kiyi was only just over a year old, but Ikem knew he would throw himself in front of a fireball with no hesitation for her.</p><p>He didn’t <em>understand</em>.</p><hr/><p>Ursa sat on their bed, leaning over Kiyi’s crib. She sang a nursery rhyme that spoke of dragons and phoenixes and eternal flames.</p><p>She looked up when she saw him, smiling as brilliantly as the sun that gave her power.</p><p>“Look, Ki,” she said, picking their beautiful, perfect daughter up. “It’s Daddy! Yes, say hi to Daddy.”</p><p>Kiyi giggled, the most perfect sound Ikem had ever heard. “Hi, Daddy!” she said. Her pronunciation was still a bit off, but to him, it couldn’t be better.</p><p>He couldn’t conceive ever being separated from her.</p><p>He couldn’t conceive <em>driving her away intentionally</em>.</p><p>“Are you okay? You’re looking a bit pale.” Ursa asked, brow scrounged up in worry.</p><p>She’d been <em>smiling</em> moments before. Ever since Kiyi was born she’d been incandescently happy, as though the black cloud of misery that followed her everywhere had vanished—not completely, never completely, but …</p><p>He couldn’t take that away from her.</p><p>So he came forward, kissed Ursa’s cheek and took Kiyi from her arms.  </p><p>“Everything’s fine,” he promised her.</p><hr/><p>Ikem was being … odd.</p><p>Ursa didn’t quite know why.</p><p>But he kept staring at her at all times, could hardly be prevailed upon to relinquish Kiyi to anyone else. Sometimes, she even caught him looking at the cupboard in which she kept Zuko and Azula’s pictures.</p><p>When asked, he smiled.</p><p>It looked like a grimace, but still he reassured her that <em>yes</em>, everything was fine, <em>no</em>, nothing was out of order.</p><p>Ursa … worried.</p><hr/><p>His wife was onto him.</p><p>Well, not exactly, but Ursa was an intelligent woman, and she knew something was wrong, even if she couldn’t guess what. She would find out eventually, though, and when she did … Ikem didn’t want to imagine the heartbreak on her face.</p><p>But he couldn’t … couldn’t <em>be </em>the one who put it there. She had suffered so much and lost so much, and … Ikem believed that together, they’d scrounged up a bit of happiness for themselves in this terrible world.</p><p>He hated the reminder of how fragile it was.</p><p>He couldn’t … but he had to.</p><hr/><p>“Ursa?”</p><p>She turned. “Yeah?”</p><p>“I have … I have something to tell you.” Ikem’s face was glum, green eyes solemn.</p><p>“Okay,” said Ursa, cocking her head. “Does it have anything to do with how weird you’ve been lately?”</p><p>Ikem inhaled. “Yeah …” he said. “Yeah, it does. You may want to sit.”</p><p>She did.</p><p>“Ikem, you’re scaring me,” she said. “You know you can trust me with anything that’s bothering you, right? We’re in this together, remember?”</p><p>He only looked more pained.</p><p>“I have to tell you something,” he admitted. “I should’ve told you sooner, but … I was a coward.”</p><p>“Don’t say that!” Ursa protested.</p><p>“I … I am. And I’m <em>so sorry</em>.”</p><p>“Ikem …”</p><p>He took a deep breath, “Remember a few days ago when I went drinking at Fing’s tavern?”</p><p>“Yes …?”</p><p>“Well … you know how innkeepers know all the gossip?”</p><p>She frowned. “Yes …? Where are you going with this?”</p><p>“I … heard something.” He opened his eyes. They glistened. “And I’m so, so scared to tell you, because it will hurt you, and I love you so much. I can’t bear to see you hurt. But I have to.”</p><p>“Ikem …”</p><p>“It’s Zuko.”</p><p>Ursa’s world dropped away from her. Blood rushed to her ears, her heart beating in an endless, terrible litany of <em>no no no no no no no no no no no</em>—</p><p>Within a moment, Ikem was by her side, her face in his hands.</p><p>“I … he’s alive,” he said quickly, but it meant very little, because even now, she could picture thousands if scenarios which would make death look frivolous in comparison, because Ozai’s depravity knew no bounds.</p><p>“He’s alive, and as far as I can tell, unharmed. But …” He took in a deep breath. Ursa barely made any notice of it. “He’s been banished.”</p><hr/><p>At first, she just looked at him, uncomprehending.</p><p>But then he watched as realization slowly dawned on her, then growing horror. Fine, noble features tightened, golden eyes filled up with tears, fists clenched in her lap.</p><p>“He’s been banished; no one knows why. Ozai sent him out, with a ship, a crew and a mission that can redeem him.” He paused. In a way, the mission itself was worse than the banishment—how cruel a man must be, to send his child onto an impossible—<em>beyond impossible</em>—task? To make that a price of his love?</p><p>He thought of Kiyi again, sweet, tiny, helpless, dependent on him. His beloved Kiyi, whom he’d gladly die for. Whom he could not imagine seeing hurt.</p><p>He’d expected her to break down, weep and curse the Firelord to the skies.</p><p>He didn’t expect her to rise, with steel-cold determination in those gorgeous eyes he loved so much.</p><p>“Ursa?”</p><p>“I’m going to find him.”</p><p>“Ursa, be reasonable.”</p><p>She whirled on him, eyes blazing with fire that coursed through her veins. No one ever said the Fire Nobility were blessed with calm, even tempers.</p><p>“You can’t stop me,” she hissed. “I know my son’s mind. He’ll make for the Air Temples—the Western first, as it’s the closest to the Homeland. Then the Southern, the Eastern, and the Northern last.” Her breathing was laboured, sparks flying from her lips.</p><p>Breathing, she’d told him, long ago, when they laid in bed and marvelled over her swollen belly and the child she carried, was imperative to firebending.</p><p><em>Most benders have to move to bend</em>, she’d told him. <em>We don’t. We only need to <strong>breathe</strong>. </em></p><p>She’d warned him, early on, that the chances of their child bending fire were great. Kiyi’s eyes weren’t the blazing gold of firebenders, but neither did they have the vibrant green colouring common amongst earthbenders. In fact, the brown made it impossible to tell after which of her parents she took in that particular regard. That beautiful brown he fell in love with all over again every time he saw their marvellous, wonderful daughter, belonged to Fire just as much as Earth.</p><p>“There, he’ll look for clues. The Avatar after Roku would have been born into the Air Nomads, that’s why Fir—<em>Sozin</em> annihilated them. He will study their ways, their bending. After that, he will comb the world.”</p><p>She marched forward, to the closet, and started throwing her clothes out on the bed. “The Eastern Air Temple is the easiest to get to for us, as it does not require us to go over sea or Fire Nation territory. It is also one of the nuns’ temples, which means it’s at a lower altitude, which in turn makes it more easily accessible for us.” Tears were flowing freely down her face, and by the end of her tirade, her voice became choked up.</p><p>“Ursa, love, we can’t,” Ikem pleaded. He wanted to, <em>oh</em>, how he wanted to. “We have a toddler, and no way of getting across half the continent! And even if by some miracle we do that, and Zuko finds us …” he didn’t finish. He couldn’t.</p><p>But Ozai has had Ursa’s children in his clutches for three years now. Ikem dreaded to think what has become of them.</p><p>And then—</p><p>Just like that, after all the rage earlier—</p><p>She just … broke.</p><p>Fell down to her knees, fisted ebony hair in alabaster fingers, screamed, wept, <em>hurt</em>. She cursed Ozai for being a monster and Azulon for being heartless. Cursed Iroh for rolling over and allowing Ozai to take his birthright and Lu Ten for getting killed. Cursed the Earth Kingdom soldiers who did it, cursed herself for allowing this, cursed Agni himself for his cruelty.</p><p>And throughout it all, Ikem held her, smoothing away her hair, rubbing circles into her back, whispering an endless litany of reassurances and soothing words.</p><p>He let her exhaust herself, until she cried herself into fitful sleep in his arms. Carried her to bed, drawing the covers over her shoulders, tucking her in. Pressed a kiss to her brow, wiped the salty moisture from her face.</p><p>His gaze fell to her cupboard.</p><p>“I’m so, so sorry,” he said, directed at one who could never hear him. “I’m so sorry we can’t help.” Kneeling down, he opened the cupboard and smoothed a hand over the young Crown Prince’s portrait. “But you have to be strong now, okay? As strong as your mother.”</p><p>Words disappeared, carried off by some mystic wind. What could he swear, what could he promise to this child?</p><p>“We’ll save up some money, and we’ll find you. You just have to be strong until then, okay?”</p><p>He closed his eyes and offered his own prayer to the Spirits.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. rise from the ashes (this is war)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>well ... i'm late.<br/>i actually have an explanation, though. my laptop was broken, and i absolutely loathe typing on my phone ... so here we are. </p><p>anyway, thanks for sticking with me for so long :)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Mum was sad.</p><p>That wasn’t odd—mum was always a bit sad, no matter how happy she seemed to be at the same time.</p><p>But still, Kiyi thought she’d be happier when the shaman came from the closest town bringing impossible news.</p><p><em>The Avatar has returned</em>, said the shaman in an excited voice, <em>he travels with a great warrior and a powerful waterbender from the Southern Tribe. The age of oppression is at an end!</em></p><p>Kiyi knew Mum was <em>from</em> the Fire Nation (But shhh! That’s a secret!), so maybe she wasn’t happy that her country was going to lose, but Mum always said she <em>wanted</em> the Fire Nation to lose.</p><p>So Kiyi was at a total loss.</p><hr/><p>She hoped the Avatar and his Water Tribe friends would come to their village. How cool would that be?</p><p>Maybe they’d let her join them! Sure, she couldn’t bend anything yet, but her parents were teaching her to fight, and she was only four. Mum told her that firebending didn’t usually appear until someone was five. She looked very sad when she said that, and when Kiyi wanted to know why, Mum smoothed her hair away from her face, kissed her forehead, and said they’d tell her when she was older.</p><p>There were many things Mum and Dad and Grandmas would only tell her when she was older. Like where in the Fire Nation did Mum come from, or what was in the cupboard she always kept locked, or when did she learn to talk like the noble ladies who sometimes came through the village on their way to Ba Sing Se.</p><p>Everyone seemed to be going to Ba Sing Se these days. Even some of the villagers.</p><p>Dad always looked sad when another family went away. He said that the trip all the way across the Si Wong Desert is more dangerous than the Fire Nation they were all running away from, and that Ba Sing Se was a big, <em>big</em> city (Kiyi didn’t really know what that would look like, as she’s never seen a city) where people who’ve been farmers their whole lives could never find work, and would always have to live in poverty.</p><p>So Kiyi was very glad their family wouldn’t ever go to Ba Sing Se.</p><hr/><p>Kiyi was playing in Grandma Annchi’s flower garden in the evening when the sky went red.</p><p>All of sudden, with no warning. Grandma Jiang quickly ushered her inside, and Mum picked her up.</p><p>“Spirits,” Grandma Annchi said, looking out to the setting sun. “Must be.”</p><p>“Where there are Spirits,” Mum said, stroking Kiyi’s hair, “there is the Avatar.”</p><p>All the adults were silent at this. Just when Kiyi was about to ask <em>why</em> …</p><p>The world went black. Or better said, the colour simply … went away.</p><p>There were bad words she was not supposed to know, and hisses and yells, until Mum lit a small fire in the palm of her hand, and Kiyi could<em> breathe</em> again, because the sleeves of her dress were still green, and the skin on her hands was pink and Mum’s eyes were still gold, and the colour didn’t go away completely.</p><p>The lantern Grandma Annchi lit, however, was still grey and white.</p><p>“How is this possible,” asked Grandma Jiang, his gaze darting between Grandma Annchi’s lantern and Mum’s fire.</p><p>“Must be something about chi-powered fire,” said Mum quietly. “Let me just …” She breathed in. The fire in Grandma Annchi’s lantern flared, and became bright orange, as it should be.</p><p>“I don’t understand,” Dad said. Kiyi had never known him to sound so scared, not even the last time the Fire Nation soldiers came to raid.</p><p>“Spirits, dear,” said Mum, shaking her head. “Something terrible has happened, I … I can feel it.” She threw a hopeless glance. “I don’t know how. It’s not in the way I feel the sun, it’s … <em>oh</em>.”</p><p>She turned towards the window. Towards the moon. The <em>black</em> moon.</p><p>“Spirits above,” she whispered. “The moon …”</p><p>Kiyi didn’t know how long it took until the moon lit up again. She kept shivering in Mum’s arms, feeling cold and empty in a way she didn’t really understand.</p><hr/><p><em>The Fire Nation attacked the Northern Water Tribe</em>, said the rumours. <em>Their terrible and cruel admiral fought his way into the very heart of their great city and slaughtered the Great Tui, Spirit of the Moon, and the world itself went dark. </em></p><p>
  <em>And La mourned for his lost lover. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>And the Avatar looked upon the destruction wrought, and the Avatar brought La’s wrath upon the Fire Nation.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>And the Fire Nation was slaughtered. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>But the Moon was still dead. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>So the Princess Yue Spirit-blessed, heart heavy with love for her people, took Tui’s mantle upon herself. And as the last breath left her lips, the Moon lit up once more.</em>
</p><hr/><p>The Avatar, Mum and Dad were talking when they thought Kiyi was asleep and couldn’t hear them, has now mastered waterbending. Mum, who seemed to know<em> a lot</em> about the Avatar, even more than the shaman from the town, said that now he has to learn earthbending.</p><p>Kiyi didn’t know if she was an earthbender yet. Dad wasn’t an earthbender himself, so he didn’t know any of the little tells Mum knew about firebending, but she thought it’d be <em>really cool</em> if she were, and the Avatar came here. Then he could teach her.</p><p>“Do you think …” Dad asked hesitantly. Kiyi’s eyes were closed so she didn’t know what exactly he did, but she felt him shift, as though he were looking around. “Do you think he’ll be followed?”</p><p>Mum sighed. “Probably. And not just by—Well. <em>That</em> was years ago, when the Avatar’s return was just a myth. <em>He</em> isn’t the only one hunting the Avatar now. Zhao was as well, and …” Another sigh. “I’m scared that now that Avatar has shown his power in the North, <em>she</em> will be sent out as well. And for all that I love her with all my heart …”</p><p>“I know,” said Dad. Kiyi felt the mattress under her move, as though he had reached out to Mum. “I know.”</p><hr/><p>“Apparently,” Dad said one morning at dinner, pressing a kiss to Kiyi’s temple, “the Avatar completely trashed General Fong’s fortress.”</p><p>Mum looked up, brows furrowed.</p><p>“I thought the Avatar was on our side,” said Grandma Jiang uncertainly. Grandma Annchi reached for her hand and squeezed once.</p><p>“I heard Fong wanted to find out if he can somehow replicate what had happened at the Northern Invasion,” Dad explained, “and he put the Avatar’s companions in danger to do so. And he succeeded, but …”</p><p>“The power was turned against him instead of the Fire Nation,” Mum finished. “Spirits above, <em>the Avatar State</em> is not something to be trifled with …”</p><p>“What’s the Avatar State?” Kiyi asked.</p><p>Mum stopped. She went very pale, and Kiyi thought she didn’t mean to say that last part out loud. Dad and Grandma Annchi and Grandma Jiang also looked curious, though so, Mum took Kiyi to sit in her lap, and began.</p><p>“You know how there were many Avatars, right, sweetie?”</p><p>Kiyi nodded. “When one Avatar dies the next one is born. And so on, and on, for thousands of years.”</p><p>“That’s right, my clever girl. Well, the Avatar State is when the collective power and skills of all the Avatars that came before them manifests in the current Avatar. That’s when they’re at their most powerful.”</p><p>That was actually <em>really cool</em>.</p><p>“Mum?”</p><p>“Yes, darling?”</p><p>“Who were the Avatars who came before Aang?”</p><p>Mum froze.</p><p>“Avatar Kyoshi was the last Earth Kingdom Avatar,” Dad said quickly. “She was so powerful she separated her home island from the mainland in order to prevent Chin the Conqueror from marching there. You remember who Chin the Conqueror is, don’t you?”</p><p>Kiyi nodded. They didn’t have school in the village since her grandmas had been only small girls, but Mum knew a lot about history and geography, so she taught Kiyi whenever she could.</p><p>“Before Kyoshi,” Mum said, “there was Kuruk of the Northern Water Tribe, and Yangchen of the Air Nomads.”</p><p>“Kyoshi, Kuruk and Yangchen,” Kiyi repeated. “Got it.”</p><p>“And after Kyoshi,” Mum continued, “there was Roku of the Fire Nation.”</p><p>“There was a Fire Nation Avatar?”</p><p>“Of course, my sweet,” said Mum, holding her tightly. “The world wasn’t always as it is today.”</p><p>“But why didn’t he stop the war?” Kiyi asked.</p><p>Dad, Grandma Jiang and Grandma Annchi all looked very curious at that.</p><p>Mum shifted uncomfortably. “It … it is said that he and Firelord Sozin—<em>Crown Prince</em> Sozin, at the time—were childhood friends.” She sighed. “He thought friendship would be enough to sway Sozin from his madness. Most of all … he thought he had time. But twelve years before the war, the volcanic island on which he lived erupted. His wife and daughter got away. Roku … wasn’t so lucky.”</p><p>“How do you know all that?” asked Kiyi. Mum smiled sadly.</p><p>“I thought you knew by now your mother was a very clever woman.”</p><p>“Yeah,” Kiyi said, and grinned.</p><p>“Anyway,” Mum continued, “Roku has … living descendants.”</p><p>“Really?” Granda Jiang asked.</p><p>Mum nodded. “In fact … his only granddaughter was married to Firelord Ozai.”</p><p>Dad, Grandma Annchi and Grandma Jiang did something weird. They all looked at Mum like she’d grown a second head. Mum still only had one head, thank you very much!</p><p>“Eeew,” Kiyi said.</p><p>Then, Mum did the most unexpected thing.</p><p>She chuckled.</p><p>“Mum?” Kiyi asked. “Are you okay?”</p><p>Tears were streaming down Mum’s face now. “Just … ah, just brilliant, sweetie. Never better.”</p><p>Everyone else was chuckling as well, and Kiyi just didn’t understand it. She always said <em>eeew</em> when Mum and Dad kissed, but no one laughed <em>then</em>.</p><p>“What?” Kiyi demanded.</p><p>“We’ll tell you when you’re older, little snowflake,” said Grandma Annchi, hiding her mouth behind a hand.</p><p>Gah. <em>We’ll tell you when you’re older</em>. Sometimes it seemed like the world had a layer upon it every person in Kiyi’s family save Kiyi herself had access to.</p><p>“You’re no fun!” she accused.</p><p>To her four year-old self, it was the worst insult imaginable.</p><hr/><p>
  <em>Your Princess Azula, clever and beautiful, disguised herself as the enemy and entered the Earth Kingdom's Capital. In Ba Sing Se, she found her brother Zuko, and together they faced the Avatar …</em>
</p><p>
  <em>And the Avatar fell! And the Earth Kingdom fell!</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Azula's agents quickly overtook the entire city. They went to Ba Sing Se's great walls … </em>
</p><p>
  <em>And brought them down!</em>
</p><p>
  <em>The armies of the Fire Nation surged through the walls and swarmed over Ba Sing Se, securing our victory.</em>
</p><hr/><p>
  <em>Ba Sing Se has fallen. </em>
</p><p>Kiyi, for all her youth, wasn’t as ignorant of the world to underestimate the importance of this.</p><p>So many of her friends’ parents had chosen to leave their little village, to make their way to Ba Sing Se. To safety.</p><p>And now Ba Sing Se has fallen.</p><p>And the Avatar was dead.</p><p>The Firelord’s children have killed him.</p><p>Kiyi hadn’t even known the Firelord had any children, but whoever they were, they must have been as terrible and awful as he was.</p><p>They had <em>killed the Avatar</em>.</p><p>And not only the Avatar, they had killed the Avatar cycle entire by striking him down in the Avatar State.</p><p>They took Ba Sing Se, they killed the Avatar, and they broke her mother’s heart.</p><p>She wasn’t quite sure how or why, but they did. Mum always carried some great sadness within her, but when she heard the Firelord’s son had killed the Avatar, she just … broke down.</p><p>Like Kiyi does when she is being childish and having a tantrum, except … not.</p><p>She’d never seen Mum like that before and it <em>scared</em> her, like nothing, not even the flesh-eating badgermoles that come out at night, had ever scared her like that before.</p><p>She wanted to help somehow, to comfort Mum, but Dad just handed her off to Grandma Annchi.</p><p>“Your mother …” Grandma Annchi tried to explain when Kiyi asked. “She has a complicated past.”</p><p>“Is that why you’re going to tell me everything when I’m older?” Kiyi asked, crossing her arms over her chest.</p><p>Grandma Annchi looked very sad. “Yes, my little snowflake, that’s why. But …” She paused, eyes falling down. “Your mother is very sad now.”</p><p>“Because the Avatar’s dead?”</p><p>“That’s … that’s a part of it, yes,” Grandma Annchi said uncertainly. “But there’s more to it. Let me tell you what, little snowflake … I’ll talk to your mother, and we’ll see about telling you ... something.” She pulled Kiyi close and hugged her fiercely. “You’re our big girl, aren’t you?”</p><p>“I am!” Kiyi said proudly.”</p><p>Grandma just kept holding her.</p><hr/><p>“Are you finally going to tell me what your big secret is?” Kiyi challenged when Mum and Dad made her sit on the bed and started wringing their hands nervously.</p><p>“Yes,” Mum said.</p><p>Oh.</p><p>Kiyi hadn’t expected it to be so easy.</p><p>“This is something that must never leave this room, Ki,” Dad said seriously. “Otherwise we’re all in danger.”</p><p>“Okay,” Kiyi said slowly</p><p>“Do you remember, sweetie, when we talked about the Avatar?” Mum asked.</p><p>Kiyi nodded. “Yangchen, Kuruk, Kyoshi, Roku, Aang.” For every name said, she curved one finger.</p><p>“And do you remember what I told you about Avatar Roku’s granddaughter?”</p><p>“She’s married to the Firelord, right,” Kiyi said, cocking her head. “Does that make her the Firelady?”</p><p>“It should,” Mum agreed. “But they’re not married anymore. Firelord Ozai was going to do a very bad thing, and to prevent it, she chose to leave the Fire Nation for good. She can never return.”</p><p>“Oh.” She frowned. “Does that mean the kids who killed the Avatar are <em>her</em> kids?”</p><p> Mum closed her eyes and a tear tell down her cheek. Kiyi felt <em>terrible</em>. She hadn’t meant to make Mum sad.</p><p>“Yes,” Mum said quietly. “Yes they are.”</p><p>Kiyi tried to wrap her head around this. The kids who killed one Avatar were another Avatar’s great-grandchildren.</p><p>“Do they know?”</p><p>“No,” Mum said carefully. “That lineage is forbidden to speak of in the Fire Nation.” Her eyebrows drooped, and she looked very sad. “Family is very important to the Fire Nobility,” she explained. “Firelord Azulon feared that if his grandchildren knew of their heritage, it might … weaken their allegiance to the Fire Nation as it is today. Firelord Ozai, as far as I know … never felt the need to change that.”</p><p>She shook her head. “That’s the worst of it all, my love … no matter how much he mistreats them, they both love him … and they’re both loyal.”</p><p>“Okay …” Kiyi said uncertainly. “But what does that have to do with you, Mum?”</p><p>Mum knelt before her, and took Kiyi’s hands into her own. “Because, sweetie …” She took in a deep breath. “<em>I</em> am Avatar Roku’s granddaughter.”</p><hr/><p>It took Kiyi a while to understand the implications of this.</p><p>Her mother … Avatar Roku’s granddaughter. The one who was married to Firelord Ozai. The one who was banished. The one whose children killed the Avatar and conquered Ba Sing Se.</p><p>Her <em>siblings</em>.</p><p><em>Her</em> siblings killed the Avatar and conquered Ba Sing Se.</p><p>“I don’t understand …” she said honestly. “I … you … <em>how</em>?”</p><p>Mum drew her into a hug and kissed her forehead, the way she knew Kiyi liked. “This doesn’t change anything, sweetie. You and your father are everything to me.”</p><p><em>I know</em>, Kiyi wanted to say. She never doubted Mum’s love.</p><p>“You love <em>them</em> too, don’t you?” she asked, sounding hoarse and very small.</p><p>Mum was crying again. Kiyi hated seeing Mum cry.</p><p>“I can’t not, Kiyi. And I wouldn’t want to.” She wiped her tears. “But that’s not why we’re telling you this.”</p><p>“Ba Sing Se has fallen,” Dad said gravely. “The Fire Nation has won.”</p><p>“My sweet, you must promise me, if we’re ever <em>not</em> there to protect you—No, Kiyi, <em>listen</em> now,” she said when Kiyi started shaking her head furiously. Her hand came up to cup her face, forcing their eyes to meet. “This is war, sweetie, nothing is ever certain. You must <em>never</em> give this secret away. You may be tempted—you may think it will protect you, but it <em>won’t</em>. It will only make you a threat to Ozai. He will want to hurt you to get back at me. Do you understand?”</p><p>Mute, Kiyi nodded.</p><hr/><p>For several weeks, nothing changed, except maybe that Ursa tripled the intensity of Kiyi’s training. She would not leave her daughter defenceless before the Fire Nation’s hordes.</p><p>Until news came.</p><p>Vague rumours seemed to be the only way Ursa received news about her children these days.</p><hr/><p>Ursa spent the Day of the Black Sun inside, clutching a dagger to her chest, It was only eight short minutes, but no bender could ever feel at peace without such an intrinsic part of their soul.</p><p>Kiyi burrowed her face into Ursa’s robes.</p><p>She’d been rising earlier and earlier lately. This was only the final confirmation of what Ursa had long suspected.</p><p>A firebender.</p><p><em>Three out of three</em>, she thought dryly, <em>how lucky</em>.</p><p>“Darling,” Ursa told her, once Agni emerged again and she could breathe. “Are you all right?”</p><p>Kiyi nodded. “That wasn’t nice.”</p><p>“No,” Ursa agreed. “It wasn’t.” She paused, unsure how to breach this topic. For Zuko and Azula, every moment of their life was carefully monitored for stray sparks. It was something they were taught to desire, to cherish, to long for.</p><p>Considering Kiyi had spent most of her life in fear of firebenders …</p><p>“I think you may be able to bend fire one day, love.”</p><p>She looked up. “Really?”</p><p>Ursa nodded, thanking Agni for the excitement in her voice. “Soon, if I’m not mistaken.”</p><p>“And you’ll teach me?” she asked, her eyes alight with excitement.</p><p>“Of course,” Ursa said, tickling her. Kiyi shrieked a laugh.</p><hr/><p>The Avatar was alive.</p><p>Zuko hadn’t killed him.</p><p>The Avatar was alive, and he’d led an ultimately doomed invasion on the Caldera.</p><p>The unrest could be felt in the air.</p><p>In the uneasy looks the Fire Nation soldiers were exchanging, these men and women who just wanted to go <em>home</em>.</p><p>In the proud tilt to the villagers’ chins, the defiant stares, the omnipresent feel of <em>hope</em> that permeated the air. </p><p>The Avatar was alive, and there was hope.</p><hr/><p>“So my brother and sister lied about killing the Avatar, then?” Kiyi asked, sweet and innocent, one night, while their little family was curled up in bed together.</p><p>“We don’t know exactly what happened, sweetie,” Ikem told her, brushing a stray lock of brown hair from her face. “It could be that they really thought he was dead.”</p><p>Ursa didn’t know what to say. She’d tried, she’d tried so hard to teach her children honesty and honour, but … she couldn’t be sure. She didn’t know her own children anymore.</p><p>“They spent a long time alone with their father,” she whispered, avoiding Kiyi and Ikem’s gazes. “He is not a good man, Ki.”</p><p>“Doesn’t he love them?” Kiyi asked.</p><p>Ursa reached out and pulled her closer, allowing her to burrow her face into her chest.</p><p>“I don’t think he loves anyone,” she said quietly. How does one explain a monster like Ozai to a child?</p><p>“But they’re his children!” Kiyi insisted, voice muffled.</p><p>“Not all parents treat their children right,” Ikem said softly.</p><p>Kiyi looked up at him, uncomprehending, and it broke Ursa’s heart. Her elder two will never be able to feel the way Kiyi did now.</p><hr/><p>There are some sensations that a human being can’t quite comprehend.</p><p>They feel … unreal.</p><p>Like you’re dreaming, looking to the world through a thick pane of glass, like everything around you is slowed down, like you’re separated from the other people by a wall of mist.</p><p>For the first few hours after the announcement of <em>the war is over</em>, that was how Ursa felt.</p><p>Well, after she stopped thinking it was a tasteless joke, of course.</p><p>But there was no arguing with the expressionless faces of Fire Nation soldiers who marched through their village on their way back to the Homeland.</p><hr/><p>
  <em>After hundred years of ceaseless slaughter, the War is over. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>The Avatar has defeated the Phoenix King Ozai and stripped him of his bending. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Sokka of the Southern Water Tribe, the Lady Toph Beifong of Gaoling and Captain Suki of Kyoshi Island have taken down his airship fleet, the fleet that was meant to burn the Earth Kingdom to the ground. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>General Iroh, the Dragon of the West, and his White Lotus freed the great city of Ba Sing Se from the Fire Nation’s clutches.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation and Master Katara of the Southern Water Tribe faced his sister, the Fire Princess Azula, in an Agni Kai duel for the throne. </em>
</p><p>
  
</p><p>
  <em>Firelord Ozai has been defeated. </em>
</p><p>
  
</p><p>
  <em>All Hail Firelord Zuko. </em>
</p><hr/><p>They didn’t really speak of it at home.</p><p>No one was really sure <em>how</em> to breach the topic. Ursa felt they were all waiting for her to do it, and for all that she hated being coddled, she was grateful for it in the same measure.</p><p>The only problem … she wasn’t sure how to breach the topic either.</p><p>
  <em>My husband is imprisoned. My daughter is insane. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>My son is the Firelord.</em>
</p><p>Would he rescind her banishment?</p><p>Would he allow her to go home?</p><p>Would she <em>want</em> to go back?</p><p>That was a stupid question. Of course she did, if only to see her children once more.</p><p>But … did they want her back in their lives?</p><p>Would they ever forgive her for abandoning them?</p><p>She wasn’t even sure she’d come to terms with the news she’d heard about them.</p><hr/><p>“My children … fought for the Dragon Throne,” she said one quiet afternoon, drinking tea with Annchi, her voice flat and void of any inflection.</p><p>Annchi watched her carefully, waiting for her to continue.</p><p>“They fought an <em>Agni Kai</em>,” Ursa said, more to herself than her mother-in-law. “During <em>Sozin’s Comet</em>. During Sozin’s Comet, Kiyi and I burrowed in the cellar and waited for it to pass.” She implored with her eyes. “Do you know what sort of <em>power</em> courses through our veins then? You can barely breathe for the blaze of your inner fire. Everything smells like burning. That amount of power is <em>not natural</em>.” She shook her head. “They’re so young … Azula shouldn’t even be old enough for an Agni Kai! She’s fifteen, for Agni’s sake! And what’s this about this Katara of the Southern Water Tribe? Agni Kais are fought on-on-one! I … I don’t understand.”</p><p>She could tell Annchi was lost in all her ramblings. Anyone who wasn’t familiar with the workings of the Fire Court would probably be.</p><p>But she was a wise woman, made wiser still by many years lived in this world.</p><p>“What’s really bothering you, Ursa?”</p><p>She paused, gaze darting anywhere but Annchi’s knowing eyes.</p><p>“They fought for the throne,” Ursa whispered, small and broken. For so long, I tried to teach my children to be kind, decent people, to love each other … and they <em>fought for the throne</em>.”</p><p>Annchi’s hand covered her own. “We don’t know what happened,” she said quietly. “We don’t know under what circumstances that happened. All we know is that your son is now Firelord, and that <em>the war is over</em>.”</p><p>“My son … taught the Avatar how to firebend,” Ursa whispered. “He did not kill the Avatar … he taught him firebending. He … he ended the war.” Her voice stronger, she repeated,” My son ended the war.”</p><p>Annchi was smiling. “Yeah. Yeah, he did.” She leaned back in her chair. “And what are you going to do about that?”</p><p>Ursa felt her lips curving into a grin.</p><p>“I’m going to find him.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>First of all, let's appreciate the absolute ridiculousness of the fact that in the comics, Ursa, banished from the Fire Nation, settles... in the Fire Nation. I'm not even going to go into the whole ~changing her face~ *sigh*, really? ~Zuko isn't actually Ozai's son, gasp!~ no, they look almost exactly alike for funsies, stuff. </p><p>Second of all, I honestly don't know how they came to the idea that Ursa wasn't high-born, because??? Roku obviously is? And Ta Min? So high up they are the childhood companions of Prince Sozin???</p><p>Third of all ... we all know how obsessed the FN nobility are with bending prowess. Especially the royal family. I sincerely doubt Azulon would marry his son to a non-bender. Just ... no.</p><p>Anyway, thanks for reading!</p><p> </p><p>  <a href="https://www.tumblr.com/blog/view/stars-and-darkness">Tumblr.</a></p></blockquote></div></div>
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